Tekken Tag Tournament 2 finally arrives in Japanese arcades tomorrow. It's to be said that Namco and Katsuhiro Harada heavily hypes the game since the announcement of its making during the Tougeki 2010. This follow up to Tekken Tag Tournament released in 1999 runs on System 369 and uses the same principle with 2-on-2 fighting where members of a same team can be interchanged at any time during the fight. Partner can also be called for 2-on-1 attacks, combos, throwing enemies against walls. This way, you can inflict more damage but also destroy the walls and thus land in a new area. Another feature of TTT 2 is the pairs of related characters (father/son, robot/creator, ...), they have special poses in case of victory or defeat and they can make special combos (Tag Assault) that inflict more damage. Multiplayer has an important place in this episode: up to four players at once can share a local game and the game can be played online worldwide in teams of six. Tekken Tag Tournament 2 supports Bandai Namco's BANA Passport to save data and unlock costumes and weapons: Each character is customizable to the last detail and can carry thirty objects that can be used in combat (Item Move). The number of playable characters reaches record number with forty fighters: all those who were in Tekken 6 as well as older characters such as Jinpachi Mishima (Tekken 5), True Ogre (Tekken 3) and Jun Kazama (Tekken 2). A new character joins the cast: Jaycee, a masked wrestler. The story is a bit stupid as usual with Tekken: Heihachi Mishima has developed a drug able to rejuvenate and increase the longevity. He of course tested it on himself and to show that he's now the strongest, he organizes a new King of the Iron Fist tournament but the reason of this Tag rule is not clear).

It's gonna be party time in Villers-Perwin this weekend! Many activities will be organized on the village square from Friday to Monday for the occasion: petanque, giant role playing game, astronomy, trivia, tastings, Thaï-bo, dancing, ... Video games will be part of the show thanks to Retroludix association that will transform the main tent into a Luna Park on Saturday from 13:00 to 19:00. Retroludix will offer the public free access to a dozen arcade machines (original arcade games and pinballs) and more than 15 home consoles and vintage electronic games (Vectrex, Colecovision, Super NES, Mega Drive, Neo Geo, ...). Retro arcade decorations and old packagings will be exposed. Three tournaments will be organized: pinball at 14:00, kicker at 16:00 and "mystery" video game at 18:00. See you tomorrow in Villers-Perwin (Les Bons Villers) in the province of Hainaut for a good time.

Sega informs us of the immediate availability of a R-Tuned conversion kit for Sega Race TV. We already told you about R-Tuned - Ultimate Street Racing in our ATEI 2009 report. It's a tuning themed racing game featuring 25 American and Japanese drift and muscle cars, 3 realistically reproduced cities: New York City, Hong Kong and Tokyo (Shinjuku and Shibuya), unlimited boost and 3 driver views. Up to 4 machines (2 twins) can be linked up for multiplayer games. Kit includes step-by-step instructions with pictures, all needed wiring and connectors, a new billboard, a new steering wheel, a complete set of decals as well as the game DVD-ROM and owner's manual. Order your kit today at Sega Amusements.

Sega Network Taisen Mahjong MJ5 is released today in Japan: the upgrade will start gradually throughout the country. MJ5 runs on RingEdge, it is available in full kit or in conversion kit for each element ("live" monitor, server and satellite). "Professional league" mode and "jansu" mode (májiàng in Mandarin and meaning sparrow) will be available from November. The conditions for participation in the professional league has changed in this new version.

Announced since 2007 and then disappeared for a long time, Chaos Code is finally at the end of its journey since it's in Japan released today. Initially expected to be a 2D online fighting game on PC, it was developed by Taiwanese branch of Australian studio FK Digital, it runs on RingEdge and is distributed by Sega. The eleven characters are customizable: they each have four special moves and the player must develop a different combat strategy for each one. Before a battle, player must choose which special moves he wants to use. Using combos is very important during the game but they are easily achievable, the creators of Chaos Code, Michael and Mickey Lin wish to release a game that even beginners can have fun with. Chaos Code has a neat realization: backgrounds are varied and detailed and the fighters have many animations, some are pretty funny...

The next edition of TGS (Toulouse Game Show) will be held from November 26 to 27 in the "Espaces de Congrès et d'Exposition
de Toulouse Labège". This show, which is now in its fourth edition, is dedicated to video games, manga, anime and Asian culture, gathers professional associations and of course passionates (25,000 visitors attended the event in 2010). Two guests comming from arcade stage are announced: Katsuhiro Harada (Tekken) that will be part of Namco Bandai representatives and Yu Suzuki (After Burner, Virtua Fighter). They will be present during the two days of the show and participate in conferences, meetings questions/answers and book signings.

It's with a deep sadness that we learn about the death of Robert Brown who was credit controller at Electrocoin (European distributor of Konami, Stern and Taito) for 24 years. He died on Thursday (July 28th) following a short illness. Robert had been hospitalized earlier last month but after undergoing tests and receiving treatment, he returned home and was feeling better. Unfortunately, he died two weeks later. The funeral will be held on Tuesday, August 9 at Breakspear Crematorium on Breakspear Road in Ruislip, Middlesex (UK) at 11:45. Our sincere condolences to his family, colleagues and friends.